Friday, September 7, 2012

It's All about Me

Bill Muehlenberg has written a good piece on how a false gospel is being pitched to consumers in many Sunday-morning assemblies, usually because the point of the meeting (one cannot dignify the time as worship) is to please men and magnify the lead pastor. Here is a portion of the post:

The difference between Paul and many preachers today is that Paul wanted to please only one man: the Lord Jesus Christ. He cared not one bit about pleasing anyone else. But today we are overrun with churches which seem bent on just one thing: pleasing as many men as possible.

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[Joel Osteen] is simply affirming everything about their self-centred lifestyle. He is giving them the divine thumbs up for living a totally materialistic, selfish, and sacrifice-free lifestyle. As proof, all one has to do is consider the books he has penned. Simply look at the titles. They are most telling. Here are some of them:

-Your Best Life Now: 7 Steps to Living at Your Full Potential
-Become a Better You: 7 Keys to Improving Your Life Every Day
-Good, Better, Blessed: Living with Purpose, Power and Passion
-Living in Favor, Abundance and Joy
-Every Day a Friday: How to Be Happier 7 Days a Week
-Your Best Life Begins Each Morning: Devotions to Start Every Day of the Year (Faithwords)
-I Declare: 31 Promises to Speak Over Your Life
-It’s Your Time: Activate Your Faith, Achieve Your Dreams, and Increase in God’s Favor

Did you even see so many “yous” and “yours”? What is the message of Joel Osteen, according to these titles? It is all about me. Me, me, me. The whole world revolves around me. As long as I am happy, and successful, and feeling good about myself, well, that is the gospel message.

Jesus is merely an appendage to a selfish life here. God simply exists so that my world can continue to go well, so I can always be happy, and so I can always have the good things in life. As long as I am happy and wealthy and successful and so on, I must somehow be doing God a really big favour.

He ends with a quote from Leonard Ravenhill on the true cost of being a Christian. Read and enjoy.